Mesquite insects and treatment

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This is my first Mesqute project and I have found pinholes with fine sawdust deposits on some of the lumber.
I took the following action:
1. Cut out the affected areas.
2. Placed shorter board in freezer for three weeks.
The result looks good as I have not seen any sawdust for the last two weeks.
Question:
If I treat mesquite with an insect treatment will it ruin my finish? I plan to sand to at least 220 grit and have multiple tung oil coats.
Thanks for your help in advance.

Thanks Pete. I looked up BOROCARE and think it would kill the insects but my real concern is how it would effect the finish.
BORACARE "Dries clear, doesn’t affect future painting or staining of wood surfaces"
It seems to me that the BORACARE will be absorbed into the wood at an uneven rate and will prevent the tung oil from penetrating the mesquite at an even rate.
Anyone have experience with this situation?
Thanks
Denis

It is likely that these are the lyctid powder post beetles. They can live in the wood for two years , eating tunnels, but no external evidence. Freezing does not kill them. They tend to hatch when them warm up.

What you have are indeed powder post beetles. They will only eat at the sapwood of mesquite. If you can, I suggest cutting all the sapwood off of the boards. If you can't get rid of the sapwood and they are small enough, you can put them in the oven on it's lowest temperature setting long enough to heat the wood to about 180 for an hour or so.

My experience has been that even if you leave the sapwood on, they can still find it years later and will start eating it off again ruining whatever you have already built. Hope this helps.

Goodness, I had no idea that it would be so complicated to get rid of an insect or pest problem from my wood. I mean, I would sooner take out some insect spray from my cupboard and douse the wood. But obviously I need a better storage solution and chemical treatment in order to make sure that the piece of material I've got is still okay to work with!

Hi All,
thanks for the responses. I went ahead and cut out any portions that I could identify, built the object and finished it with Tung oil. Everything looks good but if these creatures can bounce back after two years I am not sure how successful I have been. I will check in with my customer on an annual basis to see if there is any activity. I am also interested to see how the color of the mesquite wood treated with pure Tung oil will change. It looks great now. I will try another mesquite project in the future.

We use a lot of mesquite, well north of 1000 bd ft/yr and have had powder post beetle problems before. We solved the problem by instructing the sawmill to spray heavily with Boracare after milling before the mesquite goes in the kiln. Occasionally we spray again after drying.
I suspect you used air dried mesquite, which is asking for trouble unless you spray heavily before machining.
Freezing is definitely useless; we are in Minnesota and received mesquite that was mistakenly shipped green to us in the middle of winter. We didn't see the beetles until they came out in spring; an expensive mistake the mill paid for.

To answer the question about whether kiln dried mesquite is susceptible to powder post beetles:

Theoretically, kiln drying will kill powder post beetles. That said, mesquite sapwood is a gourmet item for the little buggers. If you store your lumber where insects can get at it, there is always a chance that the beetles can reinfect the wood.
Spraying with Boracare should prevent reinfection. After the Boracare has soaked in (see directions on package), you can go ahead and finish the project. Boracare is mildly toxic, so I wouldn't use it on a cutting board, but for a finished table top this shouldn't be a problem.

Remember that Boracare is a water solution, so when you get penetration of the borate chemical, you also get penetration of the water, so you need to remove this excess water prior to using the treated wood. If you sell the wood as "treated" wood, you also need to be licensed in most states. Further, when planing the wood, this can remove most of the protection. The proper, safe disposal of the treated wood planer shavings can be an issue. Also, do you want to use borate wood for children's toys or furniture (like a crib) that might be chewed on sometimes, or for food handling uses like a cutting board or bowl, etc.? Will borates interfere with finishing.

Bottom line is that immediately after kiln drying, it might be better to have storage that does not have the lyctid powderpost beetle opportunities...the only PPB that gets in KD wood is the lyctus PPB...meaning the storage facility is closed, does not have non-KD wood or wood dried at under 150 F or wood dried by someone else, and has no wood debris including sawdust.

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